Supply and Demand (1 John 3:17-18)

“But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.” (1 John 3:17-18)

So often, we hear that this is a “dog-eat-dog world.” Every dog has to eat, and every heart has to be filled. However, the heart is a strange contraption that can only be filled with one of two things. If we fill our hearts with the love of the world, the heart becomes shut up, shrunk down, and hollow. In a world defined by supply and demand, the supply cannot possibly match the demand of our hearts - a demand for status, a demand for approval, a demand for comfort, a demand for pleasure, a demand for more. Do not for a second think that this is isolated to only our hearts, for this reaches down to our very words and works. It should be no wonder that the heart filled with such yearning cannot possibly share with a brother in need, for their own needs are forever unmet.

But if the love of God abides in our hearts, they are open and overflowing because they have found a well that never runs dry. Much like the woman at the well of John 4, she lived from man to man, from one broken cistern to another. She was shut out, shut down, and hollow. But on that day, she found a bottomless well of living water, a ceaseless supply of satisfaction that refreshed her down to the depths of her heart. No more was this a “dog-eat-dog world;” now, all the dogs could drink to their heart’s content from the fullness of Jesus Christ.

My friends, our words and our talk will always ring hollow as long as our supply is lacking, but those who love in deed and in truth are those who have found an endless fount of love in Christ Jesus. If our earthly loves leave us, we have One in heaven whose love He will shed abroad to overflowing in our hearts.